Sanscrit Writing and Language. 69 



an h is occasionally made to stand for a or e; a ^ for e or i; and a, w for o or m; — 

 is not by any means likely to have been adopted by different people independently 

 of each other. In accordance with the supposition of this vocalization having 

 commenced with the Jews, is the fact, that it is more imperfect in the Hebrew 

 writing than in any other Shemitic system in which it is used ; it is fuller, — and 

 of course was later inserted, — in the Samaritan, and is still fuller in the Chaldee, 

 the Syriac, the Arabic, and the Persian systems.* On the other hand, the 

 methods of pointing the Hebrew, the Syriac, and the Arabic, which were sepa- 

 rately invented to supply the defects of the older mode of expressing vowels that 

 is common to them all, vary considerably from each other ; and the very curious 

 vocalization of the Ethiopic or Abyssinian system, which, as well as that first 

 annexed to the Hebrew, was derived immediately from the Greek, is of a nature 

 wholly different from any that has been yet alluded to. The period when the 

 Ethiopic writing received this improvement shall be presently investigated. 



It is to the system last mentioned that I propose tracing the origin of the 

 writing which Is connected with the Sanscrit language. But as some very gross 

 errors with respect to the nature of alphabets in general, and of the Abyssinian 

 syllabary in particular, have of late been confidently and plausibly advanced ; 

 their refutation becomes necessary as a preliminary step to my progress. The 

 erroneous views to which I allude will be found collected together in the follow- 

 ing passage of a paper of M. Abel-Remusat, late Professor of Chinese in the 

 Royal College at Paris, which was read to the Institut de France in the year 

 1820. " Par syllabaire j'entends ici une reunion de signes syllabiques independans 

 entre eux, sans analogic les uns avec les autres, et par consequent indecomposables 

 ou indivisibles. Cette propriete constitue le second degre dans les trois sortes 

 d'ecritures que les gramraariens distinguent, le systeme mixte entre I'ecriture 

 alphabetique et I'ecriture figurative. On ne saurait en rapprocher la pretendue 

 ecriture syllabique ethiopienne, moins encore celles des Hindous ou des Tartares. 



in the several systems ; and still more, if the total difference of the vocalization annexed to the 

 Ethiopic system be considered in connexion with this subject ; the circumstance in question must 

 cease to mislead the judgment. 



* The modern Persian language is such a medley of different tongues that it is difficult to 

 determine to what class it should be referred ; but as to the modern Persian writing, there can be 

 no doubt of its being Shemitic, as the alphabet employed in it differs from the Arabic one, only by 

 the addition of a few letters. 



